Davis Wright Tremaine Award winners announced

August 20, 2013

The Global Law Committee is proud to announce the winners of the 2013 Davis Wright Tremaine International Law Writing Awards. Established through the generosity of Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, the award program provides a $2,000 stipend for the best student research paper written in the past year on any topic in private or public international law, with a $500 stipend for the second best paper.

This year’s winners are:

First Place: Hannah P. Fenley, The NGO Crisis in Egypt: Can International Investment Treaties Prevent Diplomatic Conflicts in the Non-Profit Sector?
Second Place: Lia Comerford, Removing Barriers to Technical Regulations: The TBT Agreement and Exceptions for Discriminatory Measures

Hannah’s paper explores recent events in Egypt involving a crackdown by the military-led government on pro-democracy NGOs operating in the country, and considers the extent to which investment treaties could serve as a source of protection and redress for those NGOs.

Lia’s paper highlights recent WTO Appellate Body decisions striking down measures adopted by the U.S. government with a view toward protecting dolphins and combatting tobacco use by minors, breaks down the panels’ reasoning, and offers an alternative interpretation of the relevant treaty provisions that would provide more flexibility to governments seeking to regulate in the public interest.

Professor Foster, the Chair of the Global Law Committee and member of the subcommittee that reviewed the submissions, offers high praise for both winners. “Both papers were exceptionally well written and researched,” he says, “and are perfect examples of the sort of sophisticated and cutting edge work that our students are doing in the global law area.”